


Dragon Whisperer: A Slightly Improbably Tale

by EchoThruTheWoods, Razziecat (EchoThruTheWoods)



Category: Compilation of Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VIII
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-31
Updated: 2020-07-31
Packaged: 2021-03-06 05:54:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,381
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25638355
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EchoThruTheWoods/pseuds/EchoThruTheWoods, https://archiveofourown.org/users/EchoThruTheWoods/pseuds/Razziecat
Summary: Sometimes, it's the princess who has to save the brave knights.
Comments: 5
Kudos: 11
Collections: FF7 Fanworks Exchange '20





	Dragon Whisperer: A Slightly Improbably Tale

**Author's Note:**

  * For [j_marquis](https://archiveofourown.org/users/j_marquis/gifts).



Dragons return to Nibelheim every spring, like swallows coming home to roost. They circle the heights of the mountains, a whirlwind of fire and shadow, scattering iridescent scales of emerald and gold. For all their ancient power, they are generally benign, passing harmlessly over the village, seeking their eyries among the rocks.

Unless someone does something supremely stupid, which is not unlikely when humans are involved.

From his precarious position behind a rock, with a dragon crouching five feet from his head and a sheer drop of hundreds of feet on three sides, Reeve Tuesti clutched his PHS and considered who he might prevail upon to come to his rescue.   
  
He might not be a damsel in distress, but he definitely needed a knight.

_____

The first knight to attempt the job arrived in a small, sleek one-man airship, buzzing the dragon’s nest like a mosquito, and not much larger in comparison. 

At the wheel on the forward deck, Cid Highwind brandished a rifle, called down to Reeve. “I got ya, Reeve! Give me a minute to power this up!” 

“No, no!” Frantic, Reeve jumped to his feet while the dragon was distracted. “We can’t kill it!”

“Why the hell not?” Cid yelled back, dodging the dragon’s lashing tail.

“Protected species! WRO rules! We’d never live it down!”

Cid’s answer was impolite at best. The dragon chose that moment to aim a blast of flame in Cid’s direction.    
  
“Hey!” Cid spun the wheel to bring the ship around, cursing. It wobbled, righted, made another pass at the mountaintop as Cid tried to get close enough to Reeve to throw him a rope.

It almost worked.

As he came in, so close that Reeve could see the muscles in his arms bunch as he readied the rope, the dragon let out another scorching shot across the ship’s bow. 

It buckled like cheap plastic. The ship lurched in mid-air, throwing Cid against the stern. The dragon followed up with a blow of its tail, rocking the little ship violently sideways. Cid tumbled over the rail, a rag doll flailing in the hot wind of the dragon’s breath.

It was fortunate that he landed on something relatively soft. 

“Cid?” came Reeve’s voice, from his cramped position underneath a hundred and eighty pounds of pilot. “Could you get off of me, please?”

“That’s the thanks I get,” Cid muttered, and winced at the snap-crackle-crunch of the airship bouncing off the side of the mountain. “What the hell are you doing up here, anyway?”   
  
Reeve pointed to a trio of tall, pointy structures in the valley below the mountain. “Trying to get the wind turbines online. It’s how we’re replacing mako power, but every time I start them up, the dragon attacks! It finally grabbed me in its claws and flew me up here. Thought I was a goner, but it hasn’t touched me since. I just can’t get down again!”

The dragon circled overhead, belling its victory cry, golden eyes keeping careful watch on its hapless prisoners.

_____

The second knight arrived on a hoverboard in a maelstrom of midnight hair and crimson cloak, golden talons clutching a three-barreled gun. Vincent Valentine rose from a crouch to his full height, long, lean and leather-clad, and looked down his aristocratic nose at the engineer and the pilot.   
  
“For the love of all that’s holy, how did you two numbskulls end up here?”

Cid bristled. “Listen, ya cut-rate carnival ghoul, just shut up and get us out!”

“Down!” Reeve cried, as the dragon dipped toward them, spike-tipped wings stirring up clouds of grit and gravel. The three men flattened themselves to the ground as the dragon rushed over them with mere inches to spare. 

Vincent rose to one knee, Cerberus aimed at the beast, but Reeve grabbed his arm.

“No!” He told Vincent the same things he’d told Cid. Vincent’s reply was short and pithy, but he shoved the gun back into its holster.

He sighed. “Veld told me there’d be days like this.”

Reeve looked hopeful. “What do you think he’d do in this situation?”

Vincent shrugged. “I have no idea, I never listened to him.”

He produced a green materia from somewhere, his eyes glowing with concentration. “I’ll put the beast to sleep, if that’s all right with you, Mr. Conservation.”

As the dragon turned for another approach, Vincent built the spell, his body all but shimmering as magic sparked an aura around him. The wind of the dragon’s wings roared over him, sending his long hair streaming like a comet’s tail. 

It bore down on him at the speed of a runaway train. He raised his hand, the brilliant green orb caged in golden claws, ready to cast. At the last second, the dragon’s long neck snaked down, the great jaws opened, tongue flashing out.

The jaws snapped shut. Vincent cried out. A cloud of verdant green shards burst around him, chiming as they hit the ground. The dragon roared, rising into the blue spring sky, no more asleep than it had been before. As a parting shot, a swing of its tail sent the hoverboard sailing out into the chasm below them.

“Well, shit,” said Cid. “Any more bright ideas?”

_____

Reeve’s PHS was nearly out of battery. Cid had lost his in falling from his ship. Vincent, as usual, had left his at home after receiving Reeve’s call.

As the dragon flew in ever more agitated circles, diving at them every time they attempted to climb down the mountain, they held a desperate debate over who to call next. There would only be enough power for one call; they had to make it count.

Should they call Cloud? Barret? Tifa? None of their friends had a way to get to Nibelheim before the three stranded men either froze in the oncoming night, or ended up in the dragon’s belly; after all, it had to eat some time.

There was only one choice, one person who might have the resources to help them.    
  
Tseng answered on the first ring, listened to their dilemma, replied with grave determination. “Yes, there’s someone I can send. Hang tight. Help is on the way.”

As the sun set in vermillion fire, Cid and Reeve huddled on the mountain, wrapped in Vincent’s cloak against the freezing wind, while Vincent kept watch on the dragon. It crouched on a pinnacle nearby, its hot breath curling out between sharp white fangs. Curls of grey smoke puffed out of its nostrils. 

Vincent heard the helicopter first. It came, not out of the east as expected, but out of the west, its long black body a beacon of hope against the fading sun. The dragon lifted its horn-crowned head, fiery eyes narrowing.

Reeve leaped up, waving a frantic hand. “Tseng sent Turks!”

He was wrong.

The dragon rose onto its haunches, spitting sparks. The helicopter swooped past, and a small dark head leaned out of the open door, showing a wide grin in a familiar face. 

“What’s up, you dorks!” Yuffie waved, entirely too cheerful for the situation.

“I’m gonna kill him,” said Cid.

_____

The helicopter dropped out of sight behind the mountain, the whirr of its rotors fading. Reeve and Cid waited, shivering, as the sun’s last light painted the surrounding hills ember-red. Vincent stood,  a blacker shadow against the fall of night,  between his companions and the dragon.  


Minutes later, a pale glow like the rising moon appeared at the edge of the cliff. It brightened and spread, revealing a small, slim figure in WRO grays, a miner’s helmet on her head, coils of rope looped over her shoulders.

Yuffie grinned. “Hey, Cid! Hi, Reeve! And  _ Vincent _ , here I am saving your butt  _ again _ . We gotta stop meeting like this!”

On the next hilltop, the dragon let out a low rumble that echoed off the cliffs. It bared its teeth; eyes like wheels of fire focused on Yuffie. 

“Keep it down!” Cid groaned. “How’d you get up here on foot? Where’s the chopper?”

“Duh, it’s parked on that nice wide plateau down below. It’s like a ten minute easy climb.”

Three sets of eyes focused on Reeve. He had the grace to blush. “I didn’t know. I swear!”

Yuffie took pity on him. “You can’t see it from here, there’s a switchback.”

“Describe the scenery later.” Vincent reclaimed his cloak. “We need to get off this mountain.”

As if to underscore his words, the dragon spread its wings to catch the wind. Starlight glimmered on burnished gold, sixty feet wide if they were an inch. Down they swept, mantling, then up, and up, as the dragon rose in a graceful arc.

“Dang,” Cid breathed, watching as the beast banked. “That’s the only way to fly!”

“It’ll be the way we die if we don’t get a move on,” said Reeve, but he stood as transfixed as Cid, fearful and fascinated.

“If it wanted to kill us,” said Vincent, “I think it would have already. You’re more likely to die of exposure up here.”

“And with that cheerful thought--” Cid began, just as the dragon turned and headed back toward them. “Aw, hell, here it comes again! How the heck are we gonna get out of here of we can’t kill it?”

“No worries!” Yuffie climbed up onto the rock that Reeve had sheltered behind. “You didn’t have  _ me  _ with you before!”

“What the hell are you doing?” Cid yelled. “Get down before it sees you!”

“That’s the idea!  _ HEY, DRAGON!” _ She waved both arms over her head, the light on her helmet bright as day. The dragon couldn’t possibly miss her.

And it didn’t.

The dragon plummeted down toward Yuffie, wings rippling like a canopy in a hurricane, sulfurous smoke streaming from its nostrils.

Cid, Reeve and Vincent lunged toward her, fighting the waves of hot wind. 

Yuffie stood as tall as five feet-zero inches could make her, a strange, radiant joy in her face. 

The dragon’s claws snapped out, snatched her up, bore her aloft. She shrieked, her voice trailing off into laughter.

_____

“Go after her!” Cid shouted at Vincent, but he shook his head. 

“I don’t have Chaos to call on anymore. Even if I did, what if the dragon dropped her? At this height?”

“We could go get the ‘copter,” Reeve said, “chase it down, make it let her go!”

Cid pointed. “It’s coming back!”

It flew straight for the nearby pinnacle, Yuffie cradled in its claws like a toy. Her hands gripped the great talons, feet braced against the monster’s leg, her face, uptilted in wonder, spangled with reflections of golden scales. 

The dragon alighted on the rocks, settling onto its haunches, forelegs extended. Releasing its captive, it peered down, its wedge-shaped head several feet above Yuffie’s.

Reeve clutched Vincent’s arm on one side, Cid’s on the other. “This is all my fault. I should’ve let you shoot it. And all for a bunch of windmills!” 

He took a deep breath. “Vincent, you’re the strongest. Toss me over there. I’ll distract it while she’s not in its claws. Maybe she can hide among the rocks, while Cid gets the ‘copter.”

Vincent held a hand up. “Wait.  _ Look.” _

Yuffie stood unafraid, staring up into the dragon’s huge golden eyes. Lifting her chin, she began to sing.

At first it was barely audible, a low crooning like a lullaby, rising and falling. Her voice, usually so high-pitched and bright, now flowed like honey, warm, soft, soothing. 

Cid’s jaw dropped. “Who’d have thought that  _ Yuffie _ , of all people….!”

Wordless, her song wove air and starlight, peace and comfort, the wonder of flight and the magic of life itself, into a gentle hymn to beguile the golden beast. Its head began to sway in rhythm with Yuffie’s song, falling lower and lower, until its pointed chin lay on the ground before her.

Eyes half-hooded, it sighed, the great bellows of its lungs expelling a long, hot breath. Yuffie side-stepped it with ease, reached up one daring hand to pet the dragon’s nose. 

“Ow!” She snatched her hand back, scowling, stuck her finger in her mouth. 

The dragon blinked, stirred. 

All three men held their breath at once.

Yuffie sang again, a warbling note that cracked, wavered. The dragon shifted its huge bulk, claws flexing, furrowing the ground. Its tail lifted, thumped, restless.

Exhaling visibly, Yuffie straightened her shoulders. Her voice rose from deep inside her, mellow as autumn sun and as sweet, calling sleep from the very air to settle the dragon once more.

She sang, as the stars wheeled past, the mountain air grew colder, tasting of ice. Invisible in the dark, snow began to fall, delicate drops stinging the the watching men’s faces. The dragon huffed, rumbled.

Still, Yuffie sang.

The dragon’s enormous eyes fell shut. Later, Reeve would swear that it smiled.

_____

“Good thing you had those climbing ropes with you,” Reeve said hours later, over a stiff drink in his office. 

“What I wanna hear, Yuffie,” Cid said, through a puff of cigarette smoke, “is how you knew the way to calm that dragon down.”

“Yes.” Vincent, neither smoking nor drinking, spoke up from his seat in the corner. “Tell us about that, Yuffie.”

She grinned. “Fire snakes, boys. Wutaian fire snakes.”

Cid frowned. “That’s nothing like a dragon.”

“Hey, they’re both reptiles, they both snort flame. And they’re both  _ really  _ sensitive to sound.”

“Ah,” said Vincent. “I thought as much.”

Reeve perked up at that. “Yes! I think I’ve figured it out! The reason the dragons kept attacking whenever we worked on the wind turbines. 

“It was the  _ sound  _ of the motors that was irritating them! As simple as that.    
  
“All we have to do is move the turbines away from their migration route, and they should be undisturbed. It will take a little more work, but in the end, Nibel villagers will get green power, the dragons will have peace and quiet…”

“And we won’t have to go chasing your ass up mountains,” said Cid. “I like it.”

“Sorry about your ship, Cid.”

“Meh.” Cid tapped ash off of his cigarette, took another puff. “I’m due for an upgrade anyway.”

“Oh, well, that’s all right, then.”

“Yep.” Cid puckered his lips, blew out a smoke ring. “I’ll send you the bill.”

  
  


  
  


**Author's Note:**

> I sort of played fast and loose with Gaia dragons, and as far as I know, I totally made up Wutaian fire snakes. I also assumed that Yuffie grew out of getting airsick, or maybe it’s different when she’s piloting. ;)


End file.
